"Now Rayne, if this starts to hurt let me know. Alright?"
I nodded.
Loic was apprehensive, but he stepped out of Isha’s way. I held my breath. She reached for me, and her hand went into my chest like I was water. I felt a pressure in my chest. Soon I couldn't breathe. I gasped for air, just as she grabbed something and carefully pulled it out. I exhaled a groan. Loic’s eyes widened.
“on yaw…” Loic whispered.
“Yats mlac, ll’ti eb yako.” Isha repeated under her breath. Was she talking to me or herself?
The pressure grew more intense, and I felt my energy being sucked out of me somehow. I sagged down, gripping the chair at my side. Managing to stay upright.
Isha focused on her palms, as if she looked away everything would vanish. Soon there was a large sphere-like crystal with many small facets on it in her hand. The glass-like stone rested in the center of her palm. The light from that sprang to life around Chases office, the stones around mine, Chases and Loic’s necks lit up bright, flickered in each face, giving it a living glow. Chase had said these stones were once a part of this thing, was that why they lit up? I could feel the heat coming from it.
Everyone was speechless. Chase swallowed the smoke in his pipe, as surprised as everyone else.
"Amazing." Chase gasped. “This—this is it.”
“Ti T’nsaw a dnegel.” Isha whispered in awe.
Chase came closer to Isha, scrutinizing the stone. Then Chased looked up at me, eyes gleaming with a thought.
“Rayne, I want to test something, fast. If you feel anything, let me know.”
“O-kay.” My response wobbled between my lips, not sure if the word wanted to come out. I felt my lungs tighten between syllables.
I stared at the stone, seeing this thing in person didn’t feel real. But there it was. I could still feel the pulse from before. Was it actually coming from this thing? As I stared at the stone, I felt light. How? Lightheaded? Physically light? I couldn’t pin it down, but I knew something about this wasn’t ideal I just wasn’t sure how or why.
He moved to Loic and grabbed the mirror he had. Then Chase reached two fingers into it and pulled out the black petal. Loic jolted back seeing Chases movements.
“For once I’m not going to scold you for not disposing these poisoned petals properly. Remember even broken glass can be slightly useful.” Chase commented in a slightly warning tone.
Loic turned and glared at him, having a red tint to his cheeks that could have either been embarrassment, or anger. “Chase, you can’t be serious.”
“You know you’re curious too lad. You have to admit she has come out of all of this relatively unscathed.
“Relatively!” Loic blurted.
Chase walked over to the stone in Isha’s hands and placed the petal close to the light from the facets. The light intensified. It flashed bright white. Once it cleared, the petal was completely white again.
Chase nodded. “That settles that. The Mirror Stone has been neutralizing the poison, that would explain how you survived your recent encounters.”
“Got it.” The stone had been helping me heal. The combination of everything they had done helped me, along with this power. No wonder this thing was powerful. But did it have a limit? Loic said Chase’s magic could heal to stabilize someone, Isha could completely heal, and Loic’s was just a painkiller. Was there such a thing as a benefit with no consequences? That was the point of a philosopher’s stone, wasn’t it? To make something without paying the price for it. It seemed too good to be true.
A voice echoed in my head. ‘ton tcefrep.’ ‘llits kcis.’ Some words were mirrored, and others were so quiet that I could barely make them out. The ones that were almost silent, I tried to translate as they echoed through my head.
“Not perfect…” I repeated. “Still…”
Fatigue swept over me. The heat was sucked from my skin. I felt my knees wobble. Loic ran up and held me up. I slumped into his arms. Loic looked in my eyes, and his face shifted into pure fear. Then he looked up at Isha.
"Isha, put it back! Do it now!"
Isha put the stone back, hastily like putting something on a shelf that wouldn’t fit. she almost fell into Loic’s arms as well. I felt her weight and the tingle from her magic on my chest. The pulse returned, thumping several times in a row, knocking the wind out of me with each one. Her hand lingered over my chest as the light faded. Once she let go of me, I gasped and coughed, trying to get my air back. My hands fell to the floor. Loic kneeled and set me down as gently as he could and my knees balanced me out, joining me on the floor as well. His hand was firmly on my back trying to comfort me and hold my attention. In my peripheral I saw him glance up a few times, maybe towards Chase.
“Rayne.” Loic’s voice cracking as he tried to talk to me. “You’ll be fine,” He urged. His eyes getting wider and darting to find anything to help. “Please.” He started to sound like he was begging now.
I sat that way for a while. Loic gently rubbed my back as I tried to catch my breath. The pulsing slowed after a bit and the lightheadedness I felt began to fade. I grabbed Loic’s shoulder and caught his panicked gaze, trying to shoot him a smile of some sort to reassure him that I was a little better. Loic helped me back into a sitting position and forced me to look up at him fully.
His eyes were wide and fearful. I blinked, and his face only tightened further.
"Are you okay, Rayne?"
"Y-yeah. I'm fine." I said catching my breath.
Isha looked at her hands and then back up to me. She looked terrified. Her eyes were wide, and her lips trembled. She inhaled a breath and spoke to me, her next words quivered.
"Rayne, when I took the stone, did it hurt?"
I bit my lip and held my words back. Was this the time for truth? Her face begged for me to say I was okay. With Chase and Loic waiting in silence I exhaled my own breath and answered her. “I was fine at first and during the test. Then I felt like I just...” like everything tore through me all at once. Pain fatigue, weakness, everything being what was left over after time eroded my energy. Like I could only endure that for a short time then it felt like everything was being pulled from me at once. Maybe like death but I couldn't explain it.
"I felt like I was being pulled away. My body didn’t have any energy, and it wanted to sleep." I continued.
The three of them all looked at each other, exchanging silent concern. Loic huffed and moved close to me again.
Loic wrapped his arm around me, bracing me to stand and he sat me on the chair in front of Chases desk. He lingered there, moving my hair away from my face to look at me again. The concern on his face remained, despite my best efforts to smile at him. He knew as well as I did that, I wasn’t perfectly okay after that. He stayed looking at me, kneeling in front of the chair until Chase approached him and gestured to that spot. Loic stood and let Chase in but Loic kept his gaze on me and slid his hand up the arm of the chair and rested it on my shoulder. He held it firm from the back of the chair. Was this his way of letting me know he was still there and worried about me?
Chase came to my level. His eyes locked onto my gaze and the red and blue colors flashed brighter for a moment. Something I noticed happened when he read my mind before. Repeating the familiar inquisitor expression again and he sighed.
He nodded. "I now see why Luna protected you."
“How did the stone get inside me?”
Chase paused in thought, then spoke. “Well, I would assume you were born with it. Lack of direct contact with our world made it inactive. Its powers only activated when your life was in danger.”
Thinking back on that last statement, anger filled me. Why didn’t the Mirror Stone help during the car accident? Although I couldn’t remember anything, so I really didn’t know if something did happen or not.
I sighed, releasing the anger. This stone, the source of the lights and the pulses and my magical abilities, that’s what Rakesh wante
d the man who killed the princess, who ruined Mirror Image. And considering what just happened, if he got it, I would die.
The thoughts of how I could die buzzed in my head, none of the options were pleasant
My options were: Formless poison, being eaten alive by aforementioned Formless, drowning in a realm between worlds, and getting the lifeforce pulled from me. So many horrifying options for me.
I hated all of them. Where was my option where I could go back to my safe warm bed?
"So, it's because of that? Rakesh has been targeting me. What is it exactly?"
"It's a key to our curse. When the witch created Mirror Image for us, she sealed that world away with two spells. One was created as the gate to our world, the Night Mirror. The Mirror Stone, the remainder of her magic and soul, was left behind to maintain the world she created."
I thought about that. If the Mirror Stone contained what was left of her soul, but it couldn’t come into contact with the Night Mirror, did the witch intend to trap herself here in life? To act as a gatekeeper of sorts for all eternity. Or was she the one cursed and it just carried over to the ones that followed her to the world she created?
"What is the Night Mirror exactly?" I asked.
“As far as we know it is something that keeps the worlds apart. It’s the center of the in-between, the point where this world tethers to Mirror Image.” Chase leaned against his desk, pinching the bridge of his nose. Closing his eyes as he explained.
“Like how the museum connects with Isha’s home?”
“Not exactly. We don’t fully understand what it is or even if it has a physical form. All I’ve ever seen written for it was that the Mirror Stone and Night Mirror must never meet.” Isha interjected.
"What would Rakesh want with it?"
"He may just want to destroy both worlds.” Isha looked at me gravely. “We must now keep Rayne safe, more than ever."
I swallowed and looked at them. That statement ‘destroy both worlds’? The finality of Chases words stung. Was it really just me that stood between the worlds surviving? the words echoing in my head were almost deafening. The pressure tightened around me choking my breath from my lungs.
Loic shifted back around the chair, closer to me, his hand following my arm until reaching my fingers and pulling away. I turned up to try and catch a glimpse of his expression but only saw him turn his face away. His shoulders trembling slightly as he turned. Isha covered her mouth and trembled as well. Chase sat down and moved his hair out of his face.
"If the stone is removed. Rayne will die." He Intoned. That fact made me shake.
Loic turned back around to face me. his eyes narrowed. Marks on his lower lip told me he had bitten hard on it while he was turned. Was he holding something back? His gold and brown eyes brightened as he relaxed and looked at me straight on. He looked afraid, not sure of what to say. He inhaled and when he opened his mouth his brows softened, and the nervousness looked like it melted into exhaustion and concern "Well seems a twenty-four-hour escort isn’t enough now."
I stared at the ground. I was the thing standing between our worlds surviving. I pressed my hand to my chest and felt the stone pulsing in me. I grabbed on to Loic’s shoulder and stood, reacting to the pulse. He reacted and held me steady.
This magical thing that someone was willing to kill and had killed to get. If he did, not only would I vanish but so would everyone else. Loic, Chase, Isha, Juliet, my parents—all of them. Everyone and all of this fell on me being protected and staying alive. I kneeled down and tried to block everything out. I quaked so that my teeth chattered. Loic came close to me, and I scooted away. I didn’t want him to truly feel how scared I was. I shook so hard the room in my view shook. I felt so cold and clammy, like my skin was going to melt away into liquid. The pulsed on my made the feeling worse. I didn’t want him to feel how disgusting I felt, how I must have been. On top of that I felt like if he held me now, I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from letting out these feelings and cry. He looked hurt and he sighed.
"Rayne, it's okay. I won't let anything happen to you."
"That doesn't mean it can't happen.” He seemed taken aback, his eyes got wide and he took a small step back from me. he looked away and ran his hair through his fingers before reentering his gaze on me, having seemingly processed my blunt statement. I sighed. “Loic, I'm scared. I don't want to die. I don't want the fate of the worlds to be in my hands. I don't want to be responsible for this!"
“I understand that, but everything will be fine.”
“How do you know that? How can you be so comfortable with this like it’s nothing?”
He looked at the others, silently asking for assistance.
Chase bit on the end of his pipe. Isha sighed and her shoulders fell, gesturing for Loic to explain. They both looked exhausted, most likely needing a break from all of the excitement.
I could relate.
He followed Isha’s example and sighed as well before he spoke. “Magic is...complicated like this. After living with it, you just learn to accept it and let it work its way.”
“Well, I didn’t live with it. And if I let it go its way, I’m going to end up dead!”
He rolled his eyes a bit. I huffed. “Don’t you dare say I’m exaggerating. You know it’s a possibility!” He stayed still; his lips pressed together in a slight grimace. His eye shifted looking left and right but at each transition he locked his gaze at me for a few seconds. When his eyes were locked the pupils seemed to shake wanting to move but unable to. Then he would blink, and he restarted the cycle again.
Left, right, and locked. Over and over all in total silence. Loic didn’t answer. So, it was a possibility that I was right? That didn’t make me feel any better.
“The last thing I want on my plate is the fate of two worlds that I barely have any part of.”
“Rayne...”
“No.” I wouldn’t let him finish until I had said my piece. “Not even one term into my study abroad and I’m shot, beaten and nearly eaten on several occasions. It’s a wonder I’m even still sane at this point.” I had enough of trying to keep things together. This stuff didn’t happen to normal people.
What was even worse was that it was beginning to feel like I could get used to certain elements of this new life. Having Loic with me, seeing these monsters, all of the things that had happened to me seemed manageable.
Until this whole ‘I’m the chosen one trope’ thing surfaced.
Loic ran his fingers through his hair, as he did when he was at a loss.
"Rayne. I know this is a lot, but I will do all I can to help you.”
“How?” I demanded. “How can you help me Loic?”
“I CAN PROTECT YOU!” He snapped. This made me twitch a bit. Guilt seeped through my anger. He had been trying his best to protect me through all of this. And here I was, dismissing all of that. Even if I thought I was going to die, he was fighting so it didn’t happen. Was my dismissal hurting him? Was it selfish of me to be so pessimistic? Maybe it was.
Or maybe he thought I didn’t believe in him? That wasn’t true. If anything, I was relying on him too much. That couldn’t be right, using him so much. It was putting him in harm’s way too much. Even though I needed him.
I never figured that he wanted me to count on him. But he was still human. Despite him having magical powers.
Stupid Rayne. I took a breath to speak, and Loic looked at me like he wanted to say more.
"Rayne...I'd like to be..." Then he shut up, turning red..
Isha and Chase both sighed. Isha patted me on the shoulder, then left the room. Chase muttered to himself, then spoke aloud.
"I'll leave you two alone. If you need me, I'll be refilling my pipe."
And with that, he promptly left the room. I turned to Loic, who turned a darker red. What was wrong?
"Loic, are you okay? If it’s something I said, I’m sorry. I kind of went a bit nuts there. I know you’re trying.”
“It’s not...” he stopped and cupped his head in his hands. “It’s not you, well entirely.”
Not entirely? What did that mean? I approached him as he brushed his hair back, scratching the back of his head. “Sorry, this must seem strange of me...” He continued as I settled at his side against chases desk.
Strange hadn’t even begun to cover it. He had seemed a bit off. Mostly when it came to me. The snarky, dismissive boy who thought I was their lost princess had chipped away into a knight motivated by regret and duty. Now here that same man was, softened to a point he wasn’t entirely recognizable from when I first met him. Stumbling around me, seemingly not finding words to say. Hugging me, then looking away.
“If I’m going to be honest...” I finally broke the silence. “You've been acting strange since we went to the club."
"Well.” He tugged at his shirt collar. “I should ask something first. That stuff you told Juliet about me; did you mean it?"
I flinched. Was that why? That stuff about how much I felt.
How I told Juliet he was athletic, sarcastic and brave and sweet… How much I liked him. Sure, he had proved all of these traits to me more now then back when I had said about them. Was that what this was about? But I thought he didn’t like me back.
"Ah…um…" I wasn't sure if I could answer. I took a breath and looked at him. I was terrified, but it was how I felt.
"I did. I did mean it Loic. Every word. I can’t help but notice how brave and athletic you are. Skillfully saving my ass against things you can’t even see…and how kind you have been to me even though I don’t deserve anything, and just how I keep losing myself in your eyes. Not just because of the glow but something else I couldn’t place, all while thinking there was no way you could like me…I’m just the dumb girl who has to be saved, who doesn’t understand anything, your world what you’ve been through and I…" I began to ramble, and I stopped, biting my lips closed as his expression changed.
Glass Souls (Reflection Book 1) Page 27
